There were a handful of long-term consequences that the latest in a series of many head injuries had left behind. The glasses weren't a secret, perhaps not even the occasional headache. The rare, but incredibly brutal migraine attacks, not even his opium could touch, however? Those he had kept to himself.
Thus far, no one had ever picked up on him occasionally disappearing for a few days, then reemerging once he felt better. He could mostly feel them coming on, and tried to cram as much work in before he was practically incapacitated for what felt like far too long.
This time, however, Tommy must've pushed himself too far for too long. There'd been far too many things on his plate, and he had promised Charlie to take him out to the stables to ride the horses. So even though he could feel it in his temple, in his forehead, and even behind his eyes, he tried. He'd made it as far as the door leading out to the gardens before the bright light made him collapse in sudden, sharp pain.
Explaining to his son that he couldn't take him out after all had been devastating, but there was nothing he could do about it. After that, Tommy had shut himself away in his bedroom, eliminated all light and, besides getting up to occasionally run—or perhaps 'crawl' was a better way to put it—to the bathroom to throw up, moved very little.
When he heard a voice coming from behind his door, he opted to ignore it in hopes of being left alone. Unfortunately, he seemed to have forgotten that Zane no longer cared about permission, and before Tommy could protest ( or, rather, if he would've had the strength to do so ), Zane was already in the room and approaching the bed.
"And why would I have done that, eh?" he muttered, visibly annoyed that he was no longer alone. "Charlie's seen me worse, he'll be alright. He's a tough boy."
Then Zane asked—or demanded would perhaps be a better way of putting it—for him to move, and Tommy just let out a quiet grunt of defiance, while shrugging off the hand on his shoulder. "Just leave me be, Zane. I'm alright, just give me one more day of peace, would you?"
He didn't want to move. Couldn't fathom having someone else near at the moment, and certainly didn't feel like being a test subject for Zane's little experimental apothecary. Above all, he didn't want to be seen like this.
He just wanted to be alone.
"Take care of Charlie instead if he's so worried, eh? Sounds like he needs you more than I do."
